Branching Paths is a documentary that follows the director’s in-depth examination of the Japanese indie game scene. Throughout the documentary, which spans over the course of 2013 to 2015, you’ll see just how diverse it really is; all sorts of different people are introduced in Branching Paths. Of course most are of Japanese nationality, but there is a swath of internationalism that makes its way into the documentary, with westerners creating a foothold in Japan and becoming part of the diverse fabric that makes up the Japanese indie game scene.

The director takes a low-key narrating role when needed. Much of the narrative is pushed by the interviews and text that pops up on the screen saying what event we are at and what the purpose of it is. A series of indie game events occur in Japan during the time span of the documentary, and we revisit the same events in different years, which shows the subtle changes, recurring faces and recurring games to see their progress. Games we are introduced to pop-up throughout the different events: Million Onion Hotel, Downwell, and TorqueL among others.

Much of the interviews focus on the culture and market of Japan as a whole and how North America is the biggest market for their indie games despite developing them in Japan. Because the PC game market in Japan is so small, it is important for developers to make their games available on mobile or consoles, whereas to appeal to the North American market they almost always need to be on PC. Many games are crowdsourced or find their success in the North American market before being able to become successful in Japan. We also see the progression of the promotion of indie games by big publishers such as Sony and Microsoft, carving out spaces at the Tokyo Game Show, and creating an event just for indies in the form of BitSummit.

Interviews with higher profile Japanese indie developers such as Keiji Inafune of Mighty No. 9, Lucas Pope of Papers Please, Dylan Cuthbert of Pixel Junk (Q-Games), and IGA of Castlevania fame also make their way into the documentary. It is interesting to learn a little bit about the similarities between indie developers no matter their origins. There are many other lesser-known/locally known people who add to the composition of the documentary. A segment of the documentary also explores the blurring of the lines between traditional “doujin” (self-published) media like comic books and the indie game market.

We don’t really get to know much about the director herself other than she was born in France, and grew up on Japanese games. It would have been nice to learn a little more about the director during the first part of the movie, but it was obvious they didn’t want to lose focus from what the actual subject of the documentary was. The director is possibly on screen one or two times but her personal journey feels more like a disembodied journey as a result. She narrates two or three times and the last part of the documentary she doesn’t make any other narrations. The quality of the cinematography is quite good, and I was only frazzled by a couple of weird shots they kept re-using, such as focusing in on a person’s top half of their head and not seeing their mouth, or people’s fingers. B-roll like this probably could have been better replaced by more video about that developer’s game or something.

Another thing to note about Branching Paths, is that it is subtitled about 90% of the time. The documentary is interestingly multilingual as you’ll see most interviews in Japanese, a few interviews in English, and the bits of narration done in French. If you aren’t a fan of subtitles, it might not be for you, but you’d have to be gifted in language to enjoy this without subtitles. It would have also been nice if the documentary spaced out interviews a bit at times so as to not have to read subtitles while also having to read titling about events/dates.

Branching Paths is an interesting look into a niche market in the overall gaming industry. A lot of focus has been put on indie gaming and mobile gaming in the past few years, and focusing on this area is a unique subject. Most of what is learned in this documentary may be more interesting for people who aren’t particularly sensitive to the nuances of gaming culture/markets, but even I learned a few things from this documentary. It held my interest throughout and didn’t really drag at any point. Branching Paths is available on Steam for $9.99.

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I’ll say a sentence, and for various majors, I will translate for you:

–

“In physics class, he almost fell on the slippery floor.”

Physics: “In physics class, the coefficient of friction was such that he almost collided with the ground at an impact which would be painful, but he quickly shifted his center of mass to overcome the change in displacement of his feet in relation to the rest of his body.”

Education: “Now class, make sure you watch where you step, or you might fall down and get a boo-boo!”

Business: “Judging from our third quarter report, sales are down because the floor was slippery, but our stockholders will catch us if Human Resources gets their act together.”

Chemistry: “Ka-blamo!”

Sports Management: “STEVENSON! GET YOUR ASS OFF THE FLOOR! THIS ISN’T A SLUMBER PARTY! I WANT YOU TO RUN 30 MORE LAPS!”

Theatre: “Alas, science has fallen me yet again. This floor, laden with water of Hades, seeks to claim my soul. Lo! If only thou wouldst catch me at my utmost diagonal juxtaposition, your thanks would be mine to give.”

Art: “The pea green chalkboard distracted the fleshy-colored person from the transparent water, and he slipped on the beige floor.”

Pre-law: “Your Honor, my client, the floor, had no involvement in the slippage, as the water was placed there without the floor’s consent. The floor is not slippery given the right conditions. I move for a mis-trial.”

Undecided: “Uh…..”

History: “The Mayans were a very advanced civilization. Many Mayan scholars were learned in physics, and pretty much everyone knew that if a floor was slippery, to let their slaves to mop it up and put a wet floor sign up.”

Psychology: “Your hands are jealous of the soup and its intensity. This stems back to a repressed childhood memory in which your parents used to feed you strained peas which were way too hot and you cried.”

French: “We call soup bouillabaisse. Haw haw haw!”

Journalism: “Twelve ounces of soup were detained Monday when it scalded the hands of a local moron, authorities said.”

On a chain of beautiful deserted islands in the middle of nowhere, the following people are stranded:
– Two Italian men and one Italian woman
– Two French men and one French woman
– Two German men and one German woman
– Two Greek men and one Greek woman
– Two English men and one English woman
– Two Bulgarian men and one Bulgarian woman
– Two Japanese men and one Japanese woman
– Two Chinese men and one Chinese woman
– Two Irish men and one Irish woman
– Two American men and one American woman

–

One month later, on these absolutely stunning deserted islands in the middle of nowhere, the following things have occurred:

One Italian man killed the other Italian man for the Italian woman.

The two French men and the French woman are living happily together in a “ménage à trois.”

The two German men have a strict weekly schedule of alternating visits with the German woman.

The two Greek men are sleeping with each other and the Greek woman is cleaning and cooking for them.

The two English men are waiting for someone to introduce them to the English woman.

The two Bulgarian men took one look at the Bulgarian woman and started swimming to another island.

The two Japanese men have faxed Tokyo and are waiting for instructions.

The two Chinese men have set up a pharmacy, liquor store, restaurant and laundry, and have gotten the woman pregnant in order to supply employees for their store.

The two Irish men divided the island into North and South and set up a distillery. They do not remember if sex is in the picture because it gets somewhat foggy after a few liters of coconut whiskey. However, they’re satisfied because the English aren’t having any fun.

The two American men are contemplating suicide, because the American woman will not shut the fuck up and complains relentlessly about her body, the true nature of feminism, what the sun is doing to her skin, how she can do anything they can do, the necessity of fulfillment, the equal division of household chores, how her last boyfriend respected her opinion and treated her nicer than they do, and how her relationship with her mother is the root cause of all her problems, and why didn’t they bring a goddamn cell phone so they could call 911 and get them all rescued off this godforsaken deserted island in the middle of friggin’ nowhere so she can get her nails done and go shopping…

This is a really sexy horror film because the heroine is a little 999-year-old girl played by Pamela Anderson who is the granddaughter of the famous old-time dick Jamal Anderson. In this picture she can start fires by sending sexy vibrations out of the sexy part of her little brain. She sets houses and automobiles and banks on fire and burns down several Barbies. Then men from the defense department come and want to use her as a secret military Popsicle. They tell her if she helps them they will give her a new moo moo to play with. But she is too busy fucking down a Paris and French-frying Jim Carrey. It all comes to an end when she gives up starting fires and decides to grow up and become a sexer.

MESSAGE FROM THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON TO THE BRITISH FOREIGN OFFICE IN LONDON

Written from Central Spain, August 1812

Gentlemen, Whilst marching from Portugal to a position which commands the approach to Madrid and the French forces, my officers have been diligently complying with your requests which have been sent by H.M. ship from London to Lisbon and thence by dispatch to our headquarters.

We have enumerated our saddles, bridles, tents and tent poles, and all manner of sundry items for which His Majesty’s Government holds me accountable. I have dispatched reports on the character, wit, and spleen of every officer. Each item and every farthing has been accounted for, with two regrettable exceptions for which I beg your indulgence.

Unfortunately the sum of one shilling and ninepence remains unaccounted for in one infantry battalion’s petty cash and there has been a hideous confusion as the number of jars of raspberry jam issued to one cavalry regiment during a sandstorm in western Spain. This reprehensible carelessness may be related to the pressure of circumstance, since we are war with France, a fact which may come as a bit of a surprise to you gentlemen in Whitehall.

This brings me to my present purpose, which is to request elucidation of my instructions from His Majesty’s Government so that I may better understand why I am dragging an army over these barren plains. I construe that perforce it must be one of two alternative duties, as given below. I shall pursue either one with the best of my ability, but I cannot do both:

1. To train an army of uniformed British clerks in Spain for the benefit of the accountants and copy-boys in London or perchance…